Hands-on with Samsung LED and LCD displays

Samsung announced several new LED displays and LCD monitors, and we tested them hands-on.

It’s a battle that will rage until at least 2010: Samsung and Sony have made a big splash at this year’s CES with new LED displays that could spell the eventual doom of plasma, DLP, and LCD technology.

At the Samsung booth, the big story is a new series called LUXIA, a .65-inch thin display that uses LED (light emitting diodes). The larger displays have a 240Hz refresh rate, which is a critical spec. Watching a movie and still image son the displays, it’s obvious that there are several dvantages: you can almost feel the eye strain dissipating as you watch. Blacks are much blacker. In a quick test watching an LCD and then an LED display, the LED looks like pitch black night whereas most LCDs have a slight graininess and lack the true deep black tones. Color quality is also more distinct – blues look richer and reds pop off the screen in a more vibrant fashion. Samsung has partnered with Yahoo! For on-screen widgets, which we found annoying and intrusive during an one of the X-Men movies.

Samsung also introduced two waver-thin computer displays, one that has an adjustable stand you can use to tilt the monitor at the same angle as your laptop for a secondary display The  2 millisecond response time make them ideal for gamers. The LD220 and LD190 desktop monitors are similar but use a stand. The big selling point: even at 22-inches, the LD220 will cost about $400 when it ships in a few months. As for the LUXIA line, look for them this summer.